


making time

by megancrtr



Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-26
Updated: 2016-05-26
Packaged: 2018-07-10 10:48:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,723
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6981265
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/megancrtr/pseuds/megancrtr
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They make time. Somehow. Between following up on leads about Jace and mediating Downworlder disputes and fighting demons, Alec, Izzy and Clary make time to get away.</p>
            </blockquote>





	making time

They make time.

Somehow.

Between following up on leads about Jace and mediating Downworlder disputes and fighting demons,  
Alec, Izzy and Clary make time to get away.

Alec starts it. Ducking out of a meeting one time (“When we find them, we need to bring Valentine in,” says one of the Clave members. “But I propose a kill-on-sight order for the rest of Valentine’s team.”), and he finds a bar. There’s a sports game on TV, and he gets a beer. He pretends he’s a Mundie. Pretends he’s waiting for a few friends to finish watching whatever game is on TV and that no one is issuing a kill order on his parabatai. His best friend. Still. Somehow.

Izzy finds him.

Somehow.

Oh, he realizes. She tracked his phone. But he’s not mad. There’re so many other things to be mad about. She buys a beer for herself and another one for him.

“Cheers,” Izzy says. She takes a sip and then gestures to the TV. “I hope the green team wins.”

The green team doesn’t win, but it’s okay, because it’s just a Mundie game. It’s not like they were watching the HD broadcast of Valentine vs. the Shadowhunters. They’re just living that one.

Izzy slides away next. She just doesn’t show up for a training. Alec tracks her phone, and Clary does too. The two of them find Izzy at a café. A café that doesn’t have any memories. Doesn’t have any unwanted demons or ghosts or angels. There's nothing magical about the coffee shop that sits maybe forty people when its cozy and that’s decorated with a few, sparse paintings of naked, floral people.

It’s perfect. It’s not the Institute. Not the Institute that’s on a manhunt for Valentine. On a manhunt that never stops, never gets anywhere. Alec hates the hunt. They’re just dogs barking at a squirrel. And they haven’t even seen the squirrel in months. They just bark at it, hoping that that will help it come out of hiding.

The café’s walls are beige, neutral. A good, clean, meaningless color, Alec thinks as he darts his eyes around the room, locating Izzy at the counter. She glances up at him and grins. She asks what he wants and he shrugs. Clary shouts something that sounds frothy and surgery and the two of them find a table not too close to the windows and not too far from the door.

Clary stares at something, and Alec triple-checks their proximity to exits and the obstacles in the way and on Izzy, leaning further over the counter than their parents would ever approve of and ordering them their coffee. The guy behind the counter is cute, and Alec realizes that Izzy has always had a good eye for the finer things in life: wine, chocolate and men. She has an eye for things beyond Shadowhunters and hunting. She could just stop being a Shadowhunter and blend right in with the Mundanes. Carve out a good life away from Valentine and his demons. Alec looks away from the pair, makes sure none of the Mundanes are anything else but and then checks the door.

If a demon stepped into the cafe right now, Alec knows he doesn’t have room to draw his bow. But he could easily hurl a knife into the demon's throat. The blade itches on his forearm, but only because Alec's thinking of it, remembering the weight, the grip of it in his hand.

Alec's eyes move again. To Clary. Clary who is looking at paintings. And he realizes how nervous he is for her. For the way she thinks she's invincible. For the way she dives headfirst after every demon. For the way she didn't cry when Jace disappeared. Jace –

Alec checks the exits. The obstacles. His sister. They’re here to get away. To breathe from a never-ending sprint after shadows. But breathing doesn’t mean stopping totally. Not thinking about Valentine at all, it’s about slowing the pace a little. Just… breathing.

Alec grabs a napkin from the dispenser and drops it in front of Clary.

His eyes rest on her again, and he realizes how nervous he is for Clary. For the way she accepted her mom leaving for the Clave. For the way she talks to Downworlders without Clave knowledge. For the way she scrounges for knowledge about Jace in a hunt that’s almost as fast-paced as the hunt for Valentine. And Jace --

Clary's eyes dart to Alec, and Alec looks at his sister.

"What?" Clary asks.

"Practice your runes," Alec says, even though he secretly wants Clary to never practice her runes again. To never carve iratze into herself, into her friends again. To never remember that the only thing Shadowhunters need is a steady hand and conviction. He actually wishes Clary never found out about Shadowhunters and demons and Jace. Jace who – Jace who would want Clary to stay safe. And the only way Alec knows how to protect her better is to teach. To tell her things. To make sure she has the knowledge she needs to stay safe. Because Jace will be mad at him if when he gets back and Clary is dead. "Start with healing," he says.

"I can already draw it," Clary mutters, pulling her pen out from her pocket, where it probably bumps up against her stele all the time. As she draws, Alec watches in glances. Exits, obstacles, Izzy. Exits, obstacles, Clary.

Izzy comes over with the drinks, and she scrunches her nose at Clary’s work. She changes the topic to Simon. Because Simon isn’t in the war, he’s just a newly turned vampire trying to figure out his place in the world.

Alec follows Izzy who follows Clary to the park. It’s spring and the flowers (“Tulips,” Clary mutters, running her hand along a bud.) are in bloom.

Alec tries to keep check of the faces as they blur past. Clary’s glamor is off, and she draws eyes as she laughs and sweeps her fingertips along plants. Izzy takes her glamor off moments later, and she collects even more stares with her purposeful strides and rich clothing.

Alec takes his off when Izzy turns around to talk to him. He doesn’t want people to think she’s insane.

He shifts under the gazes he suddenly feels and tries to blend in with hunched shoulders and shorter strides. “Why are we still walking?” Alec asks. “We’re here, aren’t we? Why don’t we just find a bench?”

“You didn’t have to come along if all you’re going to do is complain,” Clary answers him.

Alec looks away, looks at faces, tries to see through any glamors that might be there. He’s not complaining. Not really. Not about being here. He likes parks. But not when it’s getting close to sunset and not when a new face strolls past them every few seconds. He and Izzy can take care of themselves, but Clary can’t. Not yet.

“Fine,” Clary says. She spins and smiles at him and plucks a dandelion from the ground. She drops it behind her ear and motions them to a little trail. “Just up this way. Then we’ll sit.”

They follow a gravel path with trees just budding up a short hill. At the top, friends and couples group together, sitting on blankets, leaning against trees or perching on logs set up as benches.

Clary leads them over to an empty spot and settles down on some grass. Izzy drops down next to her. Alec hovers, checking the people, checking their exits, the way they came and potential ways they can go and—

Izzy tugs at his pant leg. “Come on, you’re blocking the sun up there.”

Alec sits down next to her. They shimmy closer together. Alec sighs out as he feels the sun hit his face. Clary starts pulling dandelions towards her. She splits the stem and ties them together, and Alec tries not to watch her. He tries to watch the surroundings, makes sure there aren’t any Downworlders or demons, but his eyes keep slipping back to Clary as she and Izzy chat, their fingernails splitting dandelion stems.

Alec’s long arm reaches out when they’ve exhausted their immediate dandelion supply. They instruct him on the length of the stem they want and sometimes request a dandelion that has turned billowing and white.

“I have a couple of wishes,” Clary explains. Alec does too. He alternates between picking white ones for them to make wishes and between yellow ones for the chains.

As the sun starts to slip behind the trees, Clary turns the chains into circles and gleefully crowns Izzy, Alec and then herself. Alec only puts half his normal effort into complaining. He’s tired from hunting yesterday, from chasing Valentine and trying to contact Jace. Besides, he also doesn’t want to ruin this moment. The moment where him and Izzy and Clary make wishes on dandelions like they’ll come true.

He thinks about the three of them just leaving the Shadow World. Clary’s mom did it. How hard could it be? She had Dot, and Alec has Magnus. They could just disappear, dissolve into the Mundanes. They could spend every afternoon in a park, making dandelion crowns and dandelion necklaces and dandelion bracelets. They could make frivolous wishes for things like promotions or children or a house.

A phone goes off.

Alec's phone goes off. He reaches for it and answers. Lydia comes on the line, and his face darkens. He reaches for the bond without thinking, makes sure Jace is alive. Makes sure the bond still flows. Makes sure it still connects them. Makes sure their life still trickles slowly back and forth, even if no thoughts, no intents pass over it.

Alec pulls off his crown, dropping it into the grass. He stands up, and Clary and Izzy hastily follow.

Lydia explains about demons, and just like that the three of them are back on the manhunt. They’re barking after the squirrel again, and Clary’s at the front of the charge for Jace.

For now.

They make time to get away. To the café. To the bar. To anywhere but the Institute.

Between following up on leads about Jace and mediating Downworlder disputers and fighting demons, Alec, Izzy and Clary make time to get away.

Somehow.

They make time.


End file.
